Posted
by
BeauHDon Tuesday May 08, 2018 @03:00AM
from the empirically-supported dept.

According to a new study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, gravitational tugs from the planets Jupiter and Venus gradually affect Earth's climate and life forms. The phenomenon occurs every 405,000 years and has been going on for at least 215 million years. USA Today reports: Jupiter and Venus are such strong influences because of their size and proximity. Venus is the nearest planet to us -- at its farthest, only about 162 million miles -- and roughly similar in mass. Jupiter is much farther away, but is the Solar System's largest planet. The study says that every 405,000 years, due to wobbles in our orbit caused by the gravitational pulls of the two planets, seasonal differences here on Earth become more intense. Summers are hotter and winters colder; dry times drier, wet times wetter. At the height of the cycle, more rain falls in the tropics, allowing lakes there to fill up. This compares to the other end of the cycle, when seasonal rains in the tropics "are less and lakes have much less of a tendency to become as full," [study lead author Dennis] Kent said. The results showed that the 405,000-year cycle is the most regular astronomical pattern linked to the Earth's annual turn around the sun, he said. Right now, we are in the middle of the cycle, as the most recent peak was around 200,000 years ago.

Im NOT joking the joke is on everybody buying into the carbon emmision taxes crap over the global warming scare. Our little planet is doing her puberty thing and we are along for the ride. Just wait and see where the north pole is gonna endup.

It's the quantities that make the poison. Especially in complex systems like our climate or biological life you often can't simply reduce things to 'this is always good' or 'this is always bad'.

For example you can also argue that water is essential to life. And indeed all life we know requires water as a solvent and carrier for other essential molecules.But there's instances where there can be too much water. And I'm not even talking about things like floods here.There's phenomenons like hyperhydration, whe

Yeah, and where are they now? Dead. Because the climate changed on them (the cause for that is unimportant) and they didn't have the smarts to try and do something about it to keep the climate right for them. Which side do you want to be on? The natural dead side or the altered alive one?

"A study by Cornell and the University of Michigan researchers found that those “highly concerned” about climate change were less likely to engage in recycling and other eco-friendly behaviors than global-warming skeptics."

Natural climate changes takes hundreds of thousands of years, about the amount of time it took for humans to become distinctly humans. Given another 400,000 years of climate change, I'm sure we could change again. The issue is what normally takes 400,000 years is taking 1-2 centuries. The only times this has happened was during mass extinction events. Maybe this time is different.

Natural climate changes takes hundreds of thousands of years, about the amount of time it took for humans to become distinctly humans.

They do? Ice covered most of the Northern US just 12,000 years ago, during the last glacial period. Oceans were ~100 meters lower back then, too... Now we're being warned about maybe a meter over 100 years (about the same rate of change as we've seen since the last glacial period) and that it's doomsday!

Still an oversimplification here, because it omits the details that matter to us humans.

Sure, evolution is a strong process and will continue to go on pretty much no matter what. I'd take an enormous and drastic cataclysm to destroy life on this planet to a point where it can't possibly recover. Some species may go extinct, others may thrive, even replace them. Maybe in total there will be more life than before.

But the big question is if we'll like the process and outcome or not, if we can adapt or not. Bec

That was a different eco system. Mostly trees and plants. Most of the animals were in the water.Also these changes took thousands of years to take place. While we are expecting changes in under a hundred years.Will man made climate change kill all life? No but much of its diversity will be killed because it is changing faster then they can adapt.

While they can move about and change diets and stuff, appreciate that somebody has already planted a flag in the ground and those sovereign citizens aren't sharing or relinquishing resources and real estate to immigrants without a fight.

What's your point, though? No one expects CO2-induced climate change to outright kill all life. But it will massively disrupt the current stable ecosystem, and human civilization.
What were the global temperatures during those periods of much higher CO2? And what were the sea levels? What effects will changes to those have on current ecosystems, and human civilization?
Also those periods of higher CO2 levels are at least 800,000 years ago.

What's your point, though? No one expects CO2-induced climate change to outright kill all life. But it will massively disrupt the current stable ecosystem

Wait, the ecosystem is stable? Or, it was? When was that? You do realize we're pretty much through the normal interglacial period, and just 12,000 years ago much of the Northern hemisphere was under hundreds of meters of ice, and the oceans were 100+ meters shallower than now. Is that stable?

Lots of data [quora.com] about submariners and CO2 - where typical levels are 4000 PPM or higher. Not a problem if it's "only" 2500 PPM.

Now, heat? Never mentioned in this thread until now, but consider elephants, rhinos, and other large land mammals (giraffes, etc) who survive daily at 30+ deg C temperatures. Maybe they move their habitat a few hundred miles North or South, but exist - they definitely can.

Now, heat? Never mentioned in this thread until now, but consider elephants, rhinos, and other large land mammals (giraffes, etc) who survive daily at 30+ deg C temperatures. Maybe they move their habitat a few hundred miles North or South, but exist - they definitely can.

"so far that your neutrons can't function properly" . . . ummm, I THINK you meant NEURONSWater is a neutron moderator (slowing them down in reactors so they can be captured by Uranium and continue the fission chain reaction), but this action has no real bearing on life processes.OTOH, NEURONS are the stuff carrying nerve impulses around the body, and over-hydration (too much water) disrupts the action of the sodium mediated electrical impulses by dropping their relative concentration to a level where the ne

Using it in a science discussion is like using mad magazine as a political text book. Yeah, they briefly touch on some parts, but they're still so over simplified or twisted that the kernel of truth they may have has become entirely unrecognizable unless you were the actual individual who wrote the article/comic strip.

They only figuratively stacked the solar panels and spent fuel rods in a tower, and compared hight. They didn't compare toxicity, let alone radioactivity. That would be a bullshit report if they actually provided numbers instead of comparing the Tower of Pisa to the Mt. Everest.

You mean that thing which has such a consistent output that we refer to the "solar constant"? The thing that varies less than.1% over 11 years? Is that "big yellow thing" you're talking about? What exactly do you think you know about this topic?

One of the participants, Greg Kopp of the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado, pointed out that while the variations in luminosity over the 11-year solar cycle amount to only a tenth of a percent of the sun's total output, such a small fraction is still important. "Even typical short term variations of 0.1% in incident irradiance exceed all other energy sources (such as natural radioactivity in Earth's core) combined," he says.

Of particular importance is the sun's extreme ultraviolet (EUV) radiation, which peaks during the years around solar maximum. Within the relatively narrow band of EUV wavelengths, the sun’s output varies not by a minuscule 0.1%, but by whopping factors of 10 or more. This can strongly affect the chemistry and thermal structure of the upper atmosphere.

...

The solar cycle signals are so strong in the Pacific, that Meehl and colleagues have begun to wonder if something in the Pacific climate system is acting to amplify them. "One of the mysteries regarding Earth's climate system... is how the relatively small fluctuations of the 11-year solar cycle can produce the magnitude of the observed climate signals in the tropical Pacific."

Even typical short term variations of 0.1% in incident irradiance exceed all other energy sources (such as natural radioactivity in Earth's core) combined)

Which is irrelevant. Just because there are even smaller sources of heat, doesn't make the 0.1% swings any more important.

Within the relatively narrow band of EUV wavelengths, the sun’s output varies not by a minuscule 0.1%, but by whopping factors of 10 or more

Whatever this effect is, it can't be big on a global scale, because we don't see any significant 11-year period in the Earth's global temperature. And, actually, since the 1980's, the output of the Sun has been decreasing a tiny bit, while surface temperatures have gone up to create new record highs. The correlation just isn't there.

An 11 year cycle is not the cause of a century long warming sudden warming trend. And while the amount of energy added to a system is important, equally important is the amount of energy removed from the system. That 11 year cycle is a constant that hasn't changed in any meaningful way as long as we've been measuring it. What has changed is the amount of CO2 and other greenhouse gases that trap heat that otherwise would be removed from the system.

Of course it doesn't. But it helps to explain why, *hundreds of years ago when science barely existed*, intelligent people could take astrology seriously.

The sun has a massive effect on us, the moon too (light, tides). So why couldn't the other heavenly bodies effect us?

And they do effect us. But since then, science has managed to quantify that effect. And that effect, it turns out, consists of gravity and pretty much nothing else. Very occasionally, like in this study, that gravity has noticeable effects on our lives.

I don't know that astrologers ever observed effects, frankly. I studied it as a youth, and there wasn't any empiricism in anything I read. When the US started running the draft by birthday (in the Vietnam years) we were joking that, astrologically, that was concentrating traits. I never heard anything about that empirically.

Posters who date from the Usenet era may remember Alexander Abian [kookscience.com], known for "VENUS MUST BE MOVED INTO AN EARTH-LIKE ORBIT" and other kookery. If there's an afterlife, I imagine he's capering and kicking his heels high at the moment.

For those who didn't RTFA - No this doesn't disprove global warming as a result of emissions. quote from the end of the article

"The climate impact from the planets pales when compared to how humans are affecting the planet from burning fossil fuels, for example. "It's pretty far down on the list of so many other things that can affect climate on times scales that matter to us," Kent said.

"All the carbon dioxide we're pouring into the air right now is the obvious big enchilada. That's having an effect we can measure right now. The planetary cycle is a little more subtle.""

Where?
It says we are in the middle of the cycle. The is 400000 years. The last peak was 200000 years ago. A cycle is the period in which it repeats, so the next maximum is 400000 years after the last. So we are hlf way between two maxima. So we are at a minimum, assuming that the cycle is roughly symetric.

You are right, that is what it says, implying we are at (or near) the minimum. Seems strange to say we are in the "middle of the cycle" because who is to say the ends of the cycle are at the maximums (rather than the minimums) which is why I quickly read it to mean we are half way between them. The USA Today article uses the same wording so it is not the summary fault. I didn't pay the $10 to read the academic paper, besides it might not say. I wonder if perhaps they mangled the response from somebody to th

Yes, I think they deliberately did not make it clear that we are at the most harmless point, because this is bad for research funding. That's why I felt I need to state that.
This might be related to the development of civilisation though. Stable conditions allowed the number of humans to increase further and further, leading to where we are today.

If you carefully read the description it says that these are roughly 400,000 year cycles and we're currently in the middle of a cycle at about 200,000 years, not at a peak. Rapid rise in temperatures has been seen in the last 200 years or so which means this cycle can't explain why we're in the middle of a climate disaster now. It might explain why the climate was a bit weird 200,000 years ago before human civilization even existed. Now consider this, if Jupiter and Venus can affect the climate despite being so far away we can't even feel when it's up in the sky, then why wouldn't burning billions of tonnes of fossil fuels also have an impact on the climate? After all humans can move mountains, why wouldn't everything that we do have an impact on climate.

The Milankovitch cycles have long known to be the cause of glacial-interglacial cycles. If we ignore the time before the Pleistocene, where the atmosphere was substantially different than today, and only focus on the last 500,000 years. The glacial-interglacial cycles have an approximate swing of 15 degrees. People are worried today about a 2 degree rise. When the temps continue to rise to those of the Eemian interglacial period, the seas will rise 25 feet, the planet will be about 4-5 degrees warmer th

Please explain. Who is attempting to ruin whose economy? Who is taxing what that would attain such a goal? More to the point, who *specifically* stands to profit? Please note that "the government" is not an acceptable answer, especially to the last one. Are specific actors in the US government seeking to ruin the US economy? Are there members of the UN seeking to ruin the global economy? To what end?

Now lets look at the mirror image of your conspiracy theory. We know there are parties who stand to gain financially from continuing to produce fossil fuels for as long as possible. We know that they would see cheap solar or nuclear power (or worse, a general decrease in energy usage) as a business-threatening proposition. We know in the past, these same corporations have done horrible things to the environment in the name of profit (leaded gas, anyone?). So why wouldn't it make more sense that these parties, with a well-known profit motive, are actually the ones spreading FUD?

Also, a 25 foot rise in sea level would be a big deal to those living on the coast. I don't think telling them just to "adapt" will soothe their worries, especially for those who live on an island. Some current projections put us beating the Eemian temperatures within my lifespan, and being 2 degreesC above that during my children's life. In the next century we could be seeing average temperatures not seen on this planet in the last 5 million years. Just because 3 or 4 degrees C sounds like a small number doesn't mean that the effects won't be catastrophic.

Yeah. It's a pity there are so many stupid people on both sides of this argument. On one side: "no nukes, no coal, no windmills!" On the other side: "The gubberment wants to kill small business by adding scrubbers to gas-fired turbines!" There's so much misinformation, bad logic, and downright nonsense. Those of us who have been in the power generation industry just shake our heads in dismay.

Because the title is "Empirical evidence for stability of the 405-kiloyear Jupiter–Venus eccentricity cycle over hundreds of millions of years" as if we already know perfectly well about the cycle, and they just show that it's stable.

Repeat after me, slowly: From a human point of view, any natural cycle that affects climates where we live must be handled in the same way as any manmade cause. This is why the proper response to climate change is engineering, not hysteria.

... we already have all the answers we need, ok? We know everything we need to know already about everything. Climate is changing, humans are the cause, and we have to make everything back the way it was. End of story thank you. We must make maximum efforts to roll back the clock because we have allowed our planet to change and that is not acceptable. Our species rose to prominence based on our ability to prevent change. Change is bad.

No, it doesn't. What it does is show amazingly well how desperately some people will cling to anything in order to explain away things they don't want to take responsibility for with some ridiculously irrelevant theory rather than deal with the facts which demands a change in behaviour.

The mere idea that these planets would have greater influence than us pumping the atmosphere full of known greenhouse gasses is outright moronic. But of course people like you jump for it, because you get to say "the dog ate my homework!", or in this case "it was all the planets fault, we can't do anything about it so let's party and forget about the whole thing." Because that's the kind of retard you are.

... some people will cling to anything in order to explain away things they don't want to take responsibility for...

Hang on, stop right there. Here is the biggest reason I can't stand eco-nazis. I am NOT responsible. You are using the wrong words, either on purpose or through ignorance, to emotionally charge your argument.

The responsibility lies with the past dozen or so generations that built up and caused this problem. I inherit this problem, I own this problem, I must be one of the many that suffer to fix the problem. But stop with the bullshit that we, alive now, CAUSED this and bear responsibility for it. All

I inherit this problem, I own this problem, I must be one of the many that suffer to fix the problem

"Responsible" does not only mean "caused".

As in, adoptive parents become responsible for the children they adopt, despite not causing those children to exist.

You (and I) are responsible for climate change in that we have to fix it or suffer the consequences. Doesn't mean we created it. It means we are taking responsibility from the careless generations before us.

I guess we will have to wait a few thousand years for the affects to be measurable enough and then we can find out.

At the height of the cycle, more rain falls in the tropics, allowing lakes there to fill up. This compares to the other end of the cycle, when seasonal rains in the tropics "are less and lakes have much less of a tendency to become as full," Kent said.
The results showed that the 405,000-year cycle is the most regular astronomical pattern linked to the Earth's annual turn around the sun, he said.
Right now, we are in the middle of the cycle, as the most recent peak was around 200,000 years ago.

I'd say they mean the peak is when it's the hottest hot, wettest wet. So now we are at the minimum? Coldest hot, driest wet. So things shoudl be getting hotter and wetter again.Climate deniers are going to love this.
Feel free to correct me, or wait a few thousand years and check to be sure.

Because it's one of the frequent stances among those who don't like the idea of human involvement and responsibility. Like most groups who think alike in some respects they're not as united as you'd make them out to be so you may use it as your 'not true Scotsman'. There can be quite diverse opinions if you're interested in the details. I'll give three examples of the spectrum, while this is certainly not an exhaustive list. Deniers can range from:

Because only deniers are desperately looking for any excuse to continue being deniers.
Scientists love extra data to put into their models so they can be more accurate in the future. But they don't feel the need to make shit up like deniers do.
But scientists now have to waste extra time explaining to deniers like yourself, it wastes their time for doing actual science, they don't like that.
Therefore deniers like it more.

No, if the cycle is 400K years, we're half-way though the cycle. We're at the "dry" end of things, we're heading towards the next wetter peak. In geometric terms, we're at 180 degrees of a cosine wave - in the trough between peaks.

Assuming that this hypothetical cycle looks anything like a sine cycle...

Also: Assuming it looks like a sine the middle is where the rate of change is the greatest.

This is one of the Milankovich cycles [wikipedia.org], which have been known and studied (by people other than Milankovitch) since at least 1941 and part of any reasonable long-term computer-supported climatic model since such were practical.

What's new here is they found physical evidence to validate the connection between this cycle and climate, and push the

The last maxima from this effect was about 200,000 years ago, and the next one will be 200,000 years from now. It can not be causing the climate change we currently see, because that is happening too rapidly for this to be the cause.